Movies: Deadpool

Alas, any movie that gets hyped has a mountain to climb once it comes time to actually sit down and watch it.

After hearing how great Deadpool was, I was eager to give it a try. Maybe, I thought, there was such a thing as a Marvel movie that wasn't the same old, same old. Maybe, I hoped, we could get something more from our popcorn flicks.

Okay, a couple considerations: (a) I didn't see this in a cinema full of people. I'm sure crowd mentality makes a big difference in how one views a film. (b) I haven't read the comics. But I firmly believe a good movie shouldn't require a viewer to already be familiar with the characters anyway. It should stand on its own.

The pros: I enjoyed the snark. And the movie is, in parts at least, visually arresting. Violent, but not gory. More Kingsmen/comic book violent, which I can stomach. Also, interesting music choices.

The cons: Some of the snark was a little too on the nose, too self-aware. And the plot was so damn pedantic. The villain was not at all interesting either. Plus, I don't think they established his abilities well enough. If things are going to come down to a fight (and they are, they always are), we need to know what everyone is capable of. And then we do a girlfriend-in-distress thing? Gag me. I don't care if that's how the story goes in the "source material" (see above); change it.

Also, the X-Men felt shoehorned in there.

And after the fabulousness of the scene on the highway, the final climax felt bland. And Deadpool's stupidity in believing the baddie could really fix his face . . . Also, what was the whole, "What's my name?" thing? That's the best catchphrase they could give the bad guy? Yawn.

Marvel seems to have a couple tiers of heroes/movies. A-list: Avengers and all their singular characters such as Iron Man, Captain America, and Thor. B-list: Ant-Man and now Deadpool. And sure these characters can (and will) show up in each other's films, but really, there is a definite hierarchy. Which is why no one thought Deadpool would make as much money as it did and why they dropped it in the "off season." Next time, after having done so well, he might get pushed closer to the summer circus, moved to the Big Tent. But can it do well against real competition? After all, maybe it only did well this time because it had no rivals.

I won't bother to go again into how tired I am of these movies. But they're putting them out almost as regularly as the comic books they're based on. Gah.

And in the end, was Deadpool different enough? It was different, but . . . It [He] was trying too hard to be anti-hero. He doth protest too much, attempting to make his case, claiming to be so different, so outside the lines. When you have to argue it that hard, it usually means the evidence doesn't support it. Otherwise you'd simply show rather than tell.

At the end of the day, Deadpool is just another in a growing stack of these films. And—dare I say it?—this one is more cute than hefty, its box office boom notwithstanding.